The Royal New Zealand Ballet celebrated its 50th birthday this year and confirmed its status as a troupe with an astonishing range of talent by staging wildly divergent productions. March saw a programme which showed off artistic director Gary Harris' astute judgment, in a bill boasting the classic Paquita Variations, FrENZy and Melting Moments, both choreographed by Mark Baldwin, and the premiere of Javier De Frutos's new Milagros.

Award rounds off memorable year for ballet company manager 31 December 2003

A New Year's honour is the perfect end to a brilliant year for Royal New Zealand Ballet general manager Susan Paterson.

Ms Paterson, made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in recognition of her work promoting dance, said the recognition was a "fantastic" surprise.

"We've had a great year. With Tutus on Tour we went to 50 centres for the 50th anniversary of the company, we had the premiere of Romeo and Juliet and finished with Peter Pan. This honour is the icing on the cake."

Cinderella is a certainty and Swan Lake can always be relied on to lay the golden box office egg. There is a beautiful tradition supporting the continued performance of the world's big white ballets. But artistic director Gary Harris, of the Royal New Zealand Ballet's triple bill featuring Saltarello, Abhisheka and The Celebrated Soubrette, believes it is "imperative that the company presents works like these, where the boundaries are pushed out for the dancers, the company and the audience.

I remember Christopher Hampson's Saltarello from its premiere season in 2001 as the most sexy, sassy and sumptuous display of pure classical dance in contemporary mode, and performed by the Royal New Zealand Ballet on that occasion, with spirit and speed, elegance and elan.

What has happened? The costumes in this new outing are the same slinky black and silver creations.

The music is, obviously, the same. Hampson has reworked some of the choreography, primarily to suit it to a larger stage.

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